Mailbag: Peaceful protests are protected, city of LCF should stick with multiple haulers

Bravo Ms. Verma. Your informed and measured March 30 response to Joe Puglia’s reductionist March 16 “whining is counterproductive” column was exactly on point. Peaceful protest and dissent are constitutionally protected rights — and responsibilities — of the American people.

It is important to add at this point that a proven, powerfully effective way for each American to ensure that their voice is heard is by calling their elected local officials. Informative web sites such as 5calls.org enables citizens to obtain the telephone numbers of their local representatives and make simple phone calls stating their positions on policy matters they deem important. It’s easy, takes literally minutes, and it works. As our former president stated in his farewell address, the best way to express opposition and exact change is to engage and take action. If you refuse to do so then, well, Mr. Puglia was right: stop whining.

A 2015 poll showed that La Cañadans preferred multiple haulers. Yet, this matter is still being debated because some people cannot deal with a few minutes of noise once a week by trucks picking up their trash.

Rather than wasting more time, why doesn’t the La Cañada Flintridge City Council just tell those whiners to dump their own trash? One of those whiners was Keith Eich (we should be glad that he wasn’t elected to the council) who stated that we would get a better rate with just one hauler. I’m not even going to try to educate him by citing the DWP as an example of “low” rates from a utility monopoly provider.

Another genius is this guy named Charles Gelhaar, who cites a kid in Newport Beach getting killed by a trash truck as an important reason why we should have one hauler. He forgot to mention that trash in Newport Beach is collected by the city’s trash collection union. In other words, Mr. Gelhaar, a single union hauling truck killed the kid. How did this bureaucrat ever get appointed to the Public Works Commission?

It seems that Councilwoman Terry Walker is the only sane voice in this matter. Why try to fix something that is not broken? No kids have been killed or even injured with three operators working the streets. Perhaps, the City Council should start addressing some more pressing problems. May I suggest revisiting the appointment of a certain commissioner?